Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Madame ZeeZee’s Nightmare, Unfinished, Light Bringer, Daughter Am I, More Deaths Than One, and A Spark of Heavenly Fire. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.”

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In Every True Woman’s Heart

February 21, 2014 — Pat Bertram

I used to be a guest on various internet radio shows, but I got burned out on the whole idea, so I haven’t been accepting any invitations. When the shows were less than an hour and focused mostly on me, they were fun, but so many of the shows featured several guests and a couple of hosts, so it was hard to know who was supposed to be talking. Also, shows with many guests to be very long, and I am not fond of talking on a phone for any length of time.

Still, when Shannon Fisher invited me to be the first guest on a new show she will be hosting, I immediately agreed. I’ve never met Shannon in person, but we are good friends. We’ve often talked about life and death via Facebook and this blog, and I admire her greatly. She’s on the board of directors of UniteWomen.org, director of Unite Against Rape, and active in various other organizations. And now she’s accepted a position as host of a show on Authors on The Air.

Not only was I invited to be Shannon’s first guest, but A Spark of Heavenly Fire was chosen to be the first book featured on her new show: “The Authentic Woman – with Host Shannon Fisher – Perspectives on the Female Experience.”

Washington Irving wrote: “There is in every true woman’s heart a spark of heavenly fire, which lies dormant in the broad daylight of prosperity; but which kindles up, and beams and blazes in the dark hour of adversity.” As I read these words a decade ago, I could see her, a drab woman, defeated by life, dragging herself through her days in the normal world, but in an abnormal world of strife and danger, she would come alive and inspire others. And so Kate Cummings, the hero of my novel A Spark of Heavenly Fire was born. But born into what world?

I didn’t want to write a book about war, which is a common setting for such a character-driven story, so I created the red death, an unstoppable, bio-engineered disease that ravages Colorado. Martial law is declared, rationing is put into effect, and the entire state is quarantined. During this time when so many are dying, Kate comes alive and gradually pulls others into her sphere of kindness and generosity. First enters Dee Allenby, another woman defeated by normal life, then enter the homeless — the group hardest hit by the militated restrictions. Finally, enters Greg Pullman, a movie-star-handsome reporter who is determined to find out who created the red death and why they did it.

Kate and her friends build a new world, a new normal, while others, such as Pippi O’Brien, Greg’s fiancée, think of only of their own survival, and they are determined to leave the state even if it kills them.

The world of the red death brings out the worst in some characters while bringing out the best in others. Most of all, the prism of death and survival reflects what each values most. Kate values love. Dee values purpose. Greg values truth. Pippi, who values nothing, learns to value herself.

The women drive the book, their sparks of heavenly fire lighting up the bleak world of quarantined Colorado, showing us love in all its guises: caregiving, motherly love, friendship. romantic love, love of life.

It’s fitting that that this book is being highlighted because Shannon herself is a true woman who embodies the spark of heavenly fire the world so desperately needs.

Books by Pat Bertram

Available online wherever books and ebooks are sold.

Grief: The Great Yearning is not a how-to but a how-done, a compilation of letters, blog posts, and journal entries Pat Bertram wrote while struggling to survive her first year of grief. This is an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.

While sorting through her deceased husband’s effects, Amanda is shocked to discover a gun and the photo of an unknown girl who resembles their daughter. After dedicating her life to David and his vocation as a pastor, the evidence that her devout husband kept secrets devastates Amanda. But Amanda has secrets of her own. . .

When Pat’s adult dance classmates discover she is a published author, the women suggest she write a mystery featuring the studio and its aging students. One sweet older lady laughingly volunteers to be the victim, and the others offer suggestions to jazz up the story. Pat starts writing, and then . . . the murders begin.

Thirty-seven years after being abandoned on the doorstep of a remote cabin in Colorado, Becka Johnson returns to try to discover her identity, but she only finds more questions. Who has been looking for her all those years? And why are those same people interested in fellow newcomer Philip Hansen?

When twenty-five-year-old Mary Stuart learns she inherited a farm from her recently murdered grandparents -- grandparents her father claimed had died before she was born -- she becomes obsessed with finding out who they were and why someone wanted them dead.

In quarantined Colorado, where hundreds of thousands of people are dying from an unstoppable, bio-engineered disease, investigative reporter Greg Pullman risks everything to discover the truth: Who unleashed the deadly organism? And why?

Bob Stark returns to Denver after 18 years in SE Asia to discover that the mother he buried before he left is dead again. At her new funeral, he sees . . . himself. Is his other self a hoaxer, or is something more sinister going on?